Why I Think Depart Means Depart In I Corinthians 7:10

I Corinthians 7:10 reads “And unto the married I command, yet not I, but the Lord, Let not the wife depart from her husband.” I suggest the Greek word “choridzo” (translated “depart” in I Corinthians 7:10 and “put asunder” in Matthew 19:6) means “depart” and does not mean “divorce” per se. Here is why I say that:

· Wigram-Green defines the word as “to separate, divide, to be separated, depart.”

· Furthermore “the word … choridzo … occurs 13 times in the Greek New Testament, and neither the King James Version nor the American Standard ever translates this word “divorce” (Roy Deaver, Bales-Deaver Debate, pg.65) or “put away.”

· It is translated “depart” in I Corinthians 7:10 in the KJV and ASV, “leave” in the NASB, and “separate” in the ESV, NIV, and RSV. Those translations get it right. A different Greek word “apoluo” is the word translated “divorce” / “put away” in the MDR passages like Matthew 19:9.

· I count 37 translations of I Corinthians 7:10 at BibleStudyTools.com and not one has “divorce.”

· Just like the word “left” as in “she left her husband” could be used to refer to divorce (even though “left” does not mean “divorce”), “choridzo” could be used to refer to divorce. And it could include divorce, but most importantly, there can be a violation of “don’t choridzo” (separate, put asunder) without a divorce taking place.

· Philemon 15, Acts 1:4, 18:1, 2, Romans 8:35, 39, and Hebrews 7:26 are other example uses of this word, and they are clearly not referring to divorce. For instance, was Onesimus divorced from Philemon?

Some reason “depart” in I Corinthians 7:10 must be referring to divorce, because after a woman violates the command not to depart she is told in verse 11 to remain “unmarried.” But if that proves she is divorced, wouldn’t the next option “be reconciled to her husband” prove she still has a husband, that she is still married? We are going to have to determine some other way.

The truth is the option “remain unmarried” wouldn’t necessarily imply all women who depart are unmarried, but only that most typically are. For example, if a teacher of a “home economics class for mothers” told her students to “go home and ask your husband what his favorite food is,” she wouldn’t necessarily be implying that all her students were married (there might be a widow or two in the group), but that most as a general rule were married, right?

Frequently in the Bible a word includes more (is broader) than what is specifically under consideration in the context. My friend Rodney Hampton recently wrote about a good example of such – “Paul commands at I Cor 6:18 to ‘flee sexual immorality.’ Paul in the context argues from the standpoint of himself and a man sleeping with a h-a-r-l-o-t (6:15) but we all know that the term fornication would certainly also forbid bestiality and homosexuality. Therefore, a homosexual or pervert couldn’t argue that based upon the context what Paul had in mind in I Cor 6:18 when he said flee sexual immorality was ONLY heterosexual fornication with a h-a-r-l-o-t. In I Cor 6:18, the very term fornication itself would command one to flee homosexuality, adultery, and all other forms of sexual immorality although the context specifically discusses and regulates against heterosexual fornication. The exact same reasoning goes for choridzo at I Cor 7:10.” For a discussion of other such general admonitions that condemn something specific but also more, read this article: https://bibledebates.wordpress.com/2022/08/11/using-the-general-to-condemn-the-specific/

It is pointed out the phrase “let not the husband put away his wife” in verse 11 is the other side of the coin of “Let not the wife depart from her husband” in verse 10, and so therefore “depart” in verse 10 must be synonymous with “put away” in verse 11. I agree we are talking about opposite gender directives here, but that doesn’t necessarily mean “depart” and “put away” have to be exact synonyms. As a parallel, notice I John 3:14 enjoins us to love our brother while verse 15 forbids us from hating our brother. Aren’t love and hate opposites? Yes, but does that mean all one needs to do to love his brother is just not hate him? Of course not; there is way more to love than that. Likewise, there is more to “put away” in I Corinthians 7:11 than there is to “depart” in verse 10. Divorce is a subset of marital separation, and they are both wrong.

Actually, since Paul switches words from “depart” (choridzo) in verse 10 to “put away” (aphiemi) in verse 11, might that imply two different (but related) things are being talked about? Why wouldn’t Paul use the same word in the very next verse if he meant precisely the same thing? So the argument made as a point against is really a point in favor of the truth that depart means depart.

Why is the point of this article so important? Because I Corinthians 7:10 is condemning marital separation and not just divorce. True, it would forbid divorce also because divorce entails separation, but I Corinthians 7:10 condemns marital separation even if no divorce ever takes place. Some of the other passages that condemn marital separation (in absence of divorce for fornication) would be Matthew 19:6, I Corinthians 7:3-5, and I Peter 3:7.

Conclusion: Why do I believe “depart” means “depart” and not “divorce” in I Corinthians 7:10? Simple: because that’s what the text actually says.

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